


Ode To My Family

by Adarian



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-01
Updated: 2016-02-01
Packaged: 2018-05-17 15:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5876200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adarian/pseuds/Adarian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the War, Samantha and Shepard are building a life together. But when Samantha is expecting their first child, old memories of Mindoir resurface and Shepard finds herself unable to sleep. After a timely intervention by Garrus, Shepard decides to pick up some better coping mechanisms.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ode To My Family

**Since we are talking about the slaver raid of Mindoir, some of Shepard's descriptions are not pleasant, but it's still PG-13 ish. Just a heads up**

Since being rescued from the wreckage of the Citadel, Shepard was not sleeping well. Her doctors had said that after the trauma she had gone through, it was reasonable to have some nightmares. Samantha had been so good to her then, staying up all night sometimes to make sure Shepard was never alone. She hated being alone now, even though she was learning to better cope with it.

A few months after the doctors had released her from the hospital, Samantha decided it was time for them to have a more permanent home. She went to Earth first and chose a beautiful piece of land in the Pacific Northwest, not far from where Kaidan had decided to settle down. Shepard stayed on the Normandy for a time, training her replacement. Eventually, she moved into their little house with a white picket fence and life became...steady. 

Samantha took a job teaching at a local university and Shepard continued her physiotherapy. They married in an elaborate ceremony, but truthfully they had snuck out the night before and formally did their vows before a Justice of the Peace. The Galaxy (and Sam) needed them to have a huge, beautiful party and Shepard didn't mind making them happy. But she needed a quiet moment with her wife first. 

Shepard went back into the service after a year of reconditioning, though she mainly stayed on planet. She joked to others that if she had spent so much time saving Earth, she might as well enjoy it for a while. Most people believed her.

When the Citadel reopened for military personnel, they decided to spend a year there to help stabilize the human presence there. Shepard hadn't realized how much she missed being in space, interacting with other species, seeing the stars up close. Samantha had missed it too and they knew they should reclaim Anderson's old apartment and try to fix it up. Their other house wasn't going anywhere. 

It was then that Samantha sat her down and told her she was ready to have a baby.

Shepard had always known that they would have children. Sam wanted two and she wanted to carry both of them. Finding a donor was not a problem. If they had announced it, half the human race would probably offered to father the Shepard-Traynor baby. Instead, they just went to their friends. In the end, they went with Steven. Cortez was more than thrilled to help them and since he resembled Shepard so strongly, it was a perfect fit. 

But shortly after Samantha got pregnant, the nightmares started again.

Shepard didn't tell her, knowing she needed her rest. Instead she would spend her nights in the living room, usually drinking and chatting through the net with Garrus. Once he was given leave, he came to the Citadel. They spent the first few days wasting time in bars or arcades, but the months of little sleep finally caught up with Shepard and they spent a night in her apartment, drinking in front of the fireplace.

Finally, Garrus asked the question that Samantha had been too scared to.

"What's wrong?"

"Did I ever tell you about my childhood?" Shepard asked, leaning on the coffee table. "About Mindoir?"

Garrus' mandibles trembled slightly. "No."

Shepard poured herself another glass. "I was born in this tiny little colony. My Dad was a farmer, my Mom a doctor. I had an uncle, cousins, and a handful of friends that were like brothers to me. When I wasn't in school, I was working the fields with my Dad and uncle Dylan. It was hard work, but I liked it. No...I loved it. I wanted to be a farmer. I loved plants and I was fascinating with transposing Earth plants safely on Mindoir, without effecting the environment. I was such a dorky little kid, lecturing people about treating natural fauna ethically." 

"You were happy."

Shepard threw back her drink and poured herself another. "Yeah, I was."

"You know, there was this guy at C-Sec I used to work with. He served on the SSV Einstein. One night when were all out at the bar, he told me about this Batarian raid his ship got called in to deal with."

"Yeah," Shepard said quietly.

"You were there, weren't you?"

Shepard closed her eyes. "Yeah, I was there."

Garrus didn't say anything and she finally filled the silence. "I was in the greenhouse and suddenly everything was on fire. The people just outside in the field...Batarians killed them right away. They were burning the crops, destroying the ground. I tried to get home to warn my Mom, but she wasn't there. I found her later in this bunker. She was trying to save someone else but they both got killed. Most of us died within the first three days. I hid, going from house to house. I didn't sleep, I just took stims and kept moving."

Shepard finished her drink and poured both of them another glass. "The Marines were pinned down and forced to watch as we got wiped out. The few of us who lived were captured by slavers. They put these things in their heads, there was blood everywhere. People screaming. I just hid. A patrol finally rescued me and brought me on the Einstein. I spent the next two years in this slum on Earth with foster parents and the minute I could, I enlisted. The Alliance saved my life. I thought it was my chance to make up for all the people I let die on Mindoir."

"You were a kid," Garrus reassured, touching her hand gently.

"The weird thing is," Shepard whispered, "I didn't think about it a lot the last few years. After everything else we've gone through, a hundred or so dead seems like nothing. But I keep thinking of my Dad. I saw him, right before a Batarian put a bullet in his head. If he could have done anything to save me, he would have. But he wasn't strong enough, not fast enough. I don't blame him...but I used to think he was a superhero and when I needed him most, the universe took him from me, right in front of me. And I think of my baby...I can't do that to her. I need to protect her. I keep going through those days again and again when I try to sleep. I keep waking up in cold sweats after these nightmares of the baby and Sam being taken by those slavers and I'm just trapped, unable to do anything."

Shepard wiped her tears away. "I'm sorry, Garrus, I don't mean to burden you with all of this shit."

"You need to talk to someone, Shep. You shouldn't be suffering like this."

"Maybe not," Shepard said softly, "but I can't tell Sam, not until the baby's born. She knows about Mindoir, I'm not hiding it from her. This has to go well. For once in my life, something needs to work. If that means I have to suffer in silence for another five months, then I will. I'm not stressing her out, not now."

"She knows you're not doing well, Shep. She sends me messages every couple of days asking if you've told me anything. We're worried about you. Everyone is worried about you. You need rest and you need help."

"Okay," she whispered. 

Garrus put his arm around her and she leaned against his shoulder. 

"Garrus," Shepard murmured. "This seems crazy, but is that furniture store still around the corner?"

"Yeah, why?"

***

Samantha heard something in the other bedroom and rose, grabbing the baseball bat from beneath the bed (Jack had got it for them, citing it as the "original home security system"). She went slowly into the next room, only to hear her wife giggling. She turned on the lights to see Garrus trying to read instructions to her when Shepard hammered two pieces of rosewood together.

They both turned to her and Sam laughed, "What's going on?"

"We've decided," Shepard said, "that if I'm going to stay up all with nightmares, I'm going to do something productive instead of drinking. So I'm building a crib."

"You're...building a crib?"

"I picked up the supplies an hour ago. It's going okay, right?"

Garrus looked at the crib and back to the leaflet. "Umm...maybe?"

Samantha asked, "Can I help?"

"You should be sleeping," Shepard protested. "Go back to bed, I'm sorry I woke you. I'll try to be quieter."

"It's hard to sleep when you're not there," Samantha admitted, lowering herself to sit beside her. Shepard held out her hand to help her down. Samantha nuzzled into her neck.

"We're also seeing a counselor in the morning," Garrus quipped.

"What's this 'we' business?" Shepard asked jokingly. "You're not spending your entire shore leave shuttling me everywhere."

"It's better than helping you build human furniture. You realize I can't use a screwdriver, right?"

"Maybe you should start with painting the walls," Samantha suggested.

"I'll start it again when I'm sober," Shepard promised. "Right now it just looks like modern art. You think I could sell it? People would buy my scrap wood if I signed it, right?"

Samantha yawned, "Get some sleep at some point, you two."

Shepard stood, helping her to her feet. She kissed her lightly and Samantha went back to bed. She woke once more in the night, surprised to find Shepard curled beside her. 

She was even more surprised to find Garrus sleeping at the foot of bed, but she could handle some Turian snoring if it meant her wife was finally getting a good night's sleep.


End file.
